Boyd_McCullough’s Jamboree_Erotic Jaguar Shapeshifter Romance

by Kathi S. Barton

  “Did you watch the DVDs?” He wasn’t sure what she was asking and told her no, they’d only bagged them up and put them in the garage to take out to the trash when it was time. “I’d like them, if you don’t mind. I would like to see if there is actual movies or music on them.”

  Her meaning made his belly churn. She thought that he’d recorded his deeds and left them in his room to watch over and over. When he stood up, she only pointed to her left and he made his way to a beautifully appointed bathroom. He didn’t take in much of it because it was all he could do to make it to the commode to lose his lunch. Joseph threw up several times as he sat there on the floor. The pictures were bad enough for him to have viewed; seeing it in actual time would kill him, he thought.

  When he was ready to talk to her again, Joseph rinsed out his mouth, then made his way back to the office. Joseph was shaky now; he’d been given a blow to his heart that he thought would never mend.

  He was surprised by the man sitting with her. Jarvis hugged him, telling him that he’d been there the entire time but waited to see if Lauren was going to work with him. He told him that he was glad to see that he’d taken his advice.

  It was too much for him and Joseph started to cry, sobbing out what he knew about Ross and how he and Evelyn were taking it. Lauren asked if his wife was at home and could she send someone there to get the DVDs, and he said that she was and that he’d call her. As soon as he got off the phone with his wife, he felt drained.

  “I didn’t want to raise a spoiled brat for a child. We were so careful not to give him too much or let him get away with too many things. We even sent him to public school, so he’d get an education in not just books but people too. I feel that we’ve exposed him to people he might have hurt without us knowing about it.” Neither of them said anything, and he thought that was about the way it should be. He needed to vent, and they seemed to understand. “When I heard about what he’d done to Reilly, I thought about the two or three times that she’d come to see me about him. I hoped that she would quit working rather than to have to deal with him. Ross had become a problem in the last few years, and it had become too much for me even back then.”

  “That’ll be brought up at his trial, I’m afraid.” Joseph said it was expected. He would as well if it were him. “You should also know that Reilly is going to marry my brother-in-law soon. They’ve just bought them a house. I don’t want it to come up later that we’re all related, and you regret helping us.”

  “No, I’d never do that. I need this closed as much as you do. But as for Reilly, that’s the other reason that I’ve come to see you. I didn’t know that she was seeing your brother, but I’m happy for her.” He took out the last of the paperwork and handed it to Lauren. “The house that she’s paying on, it’s been taken care of. I’m not sure why anyone thought that she should have been responsible for any damage that had been incurred by the fire in the first place. The child had nothing to do with it, and to be charged with arson and to have to pay for the house wasn’t right. But I have done some talking, and she has been given a full refund of the money that she’s paid toward the house, as well as all her court fees. The real culprit has been arrested and is facing charges on what he’d done. Not just to her, but to the community at large. The only thing that they’ve asked is that she sign a waiver saying that she’ll not talk about the settlement, and that she doesn’t tell anyone of the second outcome.”

  “Why did you do this? You know who I am, what I do for the president. You know that I would have done this for her too.” He didn’t tell her that he felt guilty for all the things that he hadn’t done for her about his son, but he thought that perhaps that she understood. “What happens to you, Mr. Dander? This thing with your son, it’s not going to go away. Justice needs to be served.”

  “I agree, and I’m hoping that with you at the helm, you’ll make sure that it is. As I told Jarvis when I spoke to him, this has been going on too long, and it’s time that it ended. I really had no idea that it was…. It’s much worse than…. I’m sorry.” He pulled out his handkerchief and wiped at his eyes and nose. He’d been doing that a great deal lately, just bursting into tears. “You cannot believe what we’ve found in those books. And how he’s just...worse than we ever dreamed.”

  When strong arms wrapped around him, Joseph leaned into them. It had been a long time since he’d had to lean on someone else, and he realized that he needed it more than he could ever have imagined. As he sat there, Jarvis holding him, he blubbered about some of the things that Ross had done. Telling him how very sorry he was.

  “There is no need for you to be sorry, Joseph. You’re making it right now, and that’s what matters most.” He said that he was trying to. “You’ve made a good start on this. Bringing all this to my girl, you’ve done something that no one else might have done. I cannot imagine how much this has broken you and Evelyn.”

  He looked around when Jarvis moved and sat down beside him in the other chair. Lauren was gone, and he figured that she was embarrassed for him. Jarvis seemed to understand where his mind had wandered to and shook his head after handing him a short glass of dark amber liquid.

  “The DVDs arrived and she’s going to have a look at some of them. Bear, a friend of hers, said that your wife was very helpful and that she’s glad that you’re all right. She worries for you too.” Joseph nodded, his heart simply broken. “What are your plans now?”

  “I don’t know other than to bring this here. I know that the papers are going to tear us apart, and as soon as whatever my part in this is done, I’m going to take my wife on a long cruise, I think. And I don’t think we’ll ever return here.” Jarvis thought that was a good idea. “Evelyn, she’s as broken as I am about all this. I have to tell you, Jarvis, we had no idea of those other things. None.”

  “I believe you. And so does Lauren.” He nodded and was glad that someone was on his side in all this. “I’m going to talk to my girl when she’s finished here. I think we can make your part in all this just go away. Not the part where you’ve helped us, but the other, I think we can stash that someplace where no one knows. I know that Reilly will be grateful about your help on this as well. Not including the fire and what you’ve done for her there. She’s a smart girl too, and she’ll agree that you have suffered enough.”

  “I should have listened to her when she came to me those times. I was just then getting tired of my son and his trouble. But I never knew. I know that I keep saying that. Even with him living in my home, I didn’t have any idea that he was such a monster.” Jarvis nodded and said that he’d been doing it for so long, he got used to cleaning up. “Yes, that’s what we thought too when we realized the extent of what he’d been doing. He’d gotten good at covering his tracks.”

  “You go on home now and get ready to go away for a while. And I mean a while as in, you don’t return here. We’ll take care of the rest for you.” Joseph nodded and hugged the other man again. “You’re going to be all right, Joseph. And give my love to your wife. But leave as soon as possible. Tonight, would be the best. But I don’t want you not to call me. We’ve been friends for too long for me to just let you slip away from me. You have my number, use it.”

  After he made his way home, he and his wife began the process of closing down the house. There wasn’t much to do; in recent years they’d had few staff and didn’t go out much to social events. As they were boarding a plane, neither of them spoke of Ross or what they were leaving behind. This might be just what they needed. He knew that it was for him. Holding his wife’s hand, he kissed the back of it and she laid her head on his shoulder. Yes, this was just what they both needed.

  ~~~

  Boyd sat very still at the table and tried to wrap his mind around what Lauren was saying to him and Reilly. Ross hadn’t just tried to murder Reilly, but he had committed a great many heinous crimes against countless people. Colin nudged him, and he glanced at his brother.

  “Lauren is talking to you.” He looked at
her and saw that she was speaking quietly to Reilly. “Did you hear her when she asked if it was all right if we don’t talk about Mr. Dander’s part in the harassment charges?”

  “That’s not up to me, I don’t think.” He said that Lauren was talking to Reilly about it now. “Colin, what happened here? That man got away with sixteen murders that we know of, not including the ones in the terrible accident on the highway. How could anyone have missed this all these years?”

  “I don’t know. But as you were told, if you were listening, the things that his father turned over to Lauren are going to go a long way in making sure that he never sees the light of day again.” Boyd nodded and looked at Reilly when she started crying. “Dander did something else for her too. Something about a fire.”

  She had told him last night what had happened. They had talked for hours about the incident where she had lived before and how she’d been charged with arson. Reilly started out by telling him why she thought that her name shouldn’t be on the house deed. That someone might take it from them for what she’d been charged with at her other home. She might be right, he told her, but it mattered little to him. He wanted her name there beside his. Forever.

  “I want you to own the house. It’s only fair that you know that it’s yours too.” She shook her head at him and told him that she might lose it if he did that. “I don’t understand how you could lose it, baby. It’s a house.”

  He’d been going for a joke, but it failed miserably. When she turned and looked at him, he could see the fear and hurt in her eyes. Taking her into his arms, he held her as she started talking about the fire.

  “I’d been gone all day when I came back to my condo. It was part of a co-op thing. I loved it. A nice house that was all mine without all the extra work of keeping it up. As I was getting ready for bed that night, I smelled smoke. Not a lot, but enough that I looked around my entire place and couldn’t find anything out of the ordinary.” She moved to the couch and he joined her then. “At three-seventeen in the morning, I was awoken with alarms going off in my bedroom. The fire alarms were making so much noise that I couldn’t hear. And the entire place was filled with smoke. I was disoriented and confused as I tried to get out of what I thought was my house burning down with me in it. It took me a few minutes to get out, and when I did, the house next door was a total loss. People were screaming, and I was trying to see what was going on.”

  “Did anyone call the fire department?” She said that they must have, they were coming into the area as she stumbled out of her home. “Then what happened?”

  “One of the firemen asked me if I was all right. I asked him if this was where all the smoke was coming from last night. It was an innocent question, but it put me in the middle of it. I was blamed for, at first, starting the fire, then later I was charged with arson and something about me not alerting anyone that the fire was starting. I had no idea that such an off the cuff question would have gotten me into so much trouble. I was tried and found guilty of burning the house down next door.” He asked her if anyone was hurt. “No. Luckily there wasn’t anyone living in the house. But the owners had started their renovations on it. That too went up in smoke.”

  “How was that your fault?” She said that they told her that everything would have been saved had I called the fire department right away. “And if they had found nothing, what would they have done then? And why arson? That I don’t understand.”

  “They found an accelerant that started the fire, and it was reported to have been mine. The fire marshal said that gasoline was used to start the fire and that it was at my condo. I didn’t own a gas can. I had no use for one. But they found traces of gasoline at and around my place, and put it as the reason that the house burned so quickly.”

  He knew there had to be more to it than that, but she said that if there was, she had no idea.

  Boyd listened then, when he heard Lauren mention the fire marshal. “You see, his son was going to lose the house due to being behind on the construction loan he was using to fix the house. And according to my resources, he didn’t want that to happen—the marshal didn’t want his son to move back into his own home. So, he found you confused and decided to blame it all on you. You were a scapegoat in all this.” Boyd asked her how he’d missed that. But instead of Lauren answering him, Reilly did.

  “They set fire to the house and blamed it on me. Even going so far as to dump gasoline all around the condos when they were finished to take blame away from their son. The marshal knew how to make it a slow burn, and when I said that I smelled the smoke, he jumped right on that.” She took his hand in hers. “How can people be so cruel to someone to make themselves look good?”

  “I don’t know, Reilly. I will tell you that it happens more often than not. But I do have something serious to tell you both. Mr. Dander, Ross’s father, is the one that took care of this for you.” Lauren handed Reilly a thick envelope and told her that was the refund money due to her from the house. “He and his wife have left the country. They’re not going to be charged with anything that has gone on before because of their invaluable help on this case against Ross. As I told you, we have enough evidence to take him down, and all because of his father. You can’t tell anyone about what transpired here, nor anything about going to him with harassment from his son. Without their help, we wouldn’t have enough to get him to the point where he is never getting out.”

  He watched Reilly. This was entirely up to her how she felt about this news. He was fine with it. As Lauren said, without Joseph Dander there wouldn’t be enough, and he’d gotten all the charges dropped against her in the home too. To him, they were free to do whatever they needed to distance themselves from Ross. But it wasn’t his call.

  “They helped me in ways that no one else had been able to. I’m sure that given enough time, someone in this family would have found it.” She smiled at Lauren. “One thing I’ve learned about you guys is that you’re on top of things even when you don’t need to be. But I do thank you for this. Giving me the opportunity to do something nice for the couple that’s only crime is they had Ross as a son. Yes, I’m all right with them getting as far away from this as possible. They deserve something to go their way, I think.”

  After everyone left, they sat in the kitchen and didn’t talk. He got up to get her a glass of tea and she sipped it while she sat there. They had a long list of things to do today. Getting food in the house being a big one, but he was waiting on her. Reilly had been given a lot today with all this.

  “I was wondering if you’d make love to me.” He swallowed hard, trying to gauge her mood. “You’ve been really nice about waiting until I was ready, I know that. You even gave me the big bedroom when we stayed here last night. But I’d really like for you to make love to me. I’ve fallen in love with you. And your family, but mostly you.”

  He stood up when she did. Boyd wanted to kiss her. Just taste her. So when she came to him, her arms wrapping around his neck, her body pressed tightly to his, he held her to him as he took all that she offered.

  “I love you as well. I think I have since the moment that I first saw you.” She nodded and buried her nose in his neck. Every nerve ending in his body seemed to have been awakened with that and set on high alert. “You keep that up and we’re never going to make it upstairs. I’ll take you right here on our kitchen table.”

  The look she gave him, the way that her body seemed to come alive with scents, made his cat purr. When Reilly put her hand on his chest, just over his heart, he held it there for a moment before she tore his shirt off him.

  “I’m not going to wait for you anymore, Boyd. My body is yours—I’m yours. But if you don’t make love to me, anywhere, I’m going to have to become the aggressor and take you.”

  He laughed. It felt like something just came loose inside of him, making him happy. Happier than he’d been in years. Then she bit down on his nipple, and he picked her up by her ass and put her on the bare counter.

  Chapter 7

/>   Her clothes were gone, and yet she felt warm. In fact, she was burning up, and she didn’t think she’d survive him. Boyd was touching her everywhere, nipping at her skin like she was an all-day sucker, just for him. And when he opened her legs and stepped between them, she looked down at his own nudity and his thick cock. She reached down and wrapped her hand around him, hearing him moan out her name.

  “I need you.” She nodded and fisted him. The feeling of him touching her, just the slightest bit, had her scooting forward and taking just his thick dark head into her. “Christ, you’re going to kill me. Let me fill you.”

  “Not yet. I need to feel you.” He moved forward, filling her more. “You’re cheating. Don’t you want this to last?”

  He surged forward, and it felt like he was filling her to her throat. His arms held her as he stood there, making her as much his as he was hers. He growled low, the sound of it humming over her body like a warm shower. Then Boyd moved, pulling back enough that she was afraid that he was going to leave her there. He pushed into her again, this time bringing her to a small yet devastating peak that had her begging him for more. For all of him.

  “Please. I need to come. I need to feel the earth move under me.” He grinned, his face looking like a man that had an idea, one that she was sure she wasn’t going to like. “Boyd, I’m going to hurt—”

  Her scream of release took her breath away. She saw stars and rainbows. Reilly came so quickly, so hard that she was sure that she wasn’t going to be able to give him anything else. Then he leaned down and took her entire breast into his mouth and bit down.

  There were no words that she could use to describe the incredible, delicious feelings that were racing over her mind and body. She could feel his emotions, his own needs that matched hers. Reilly pulled him up from her tender breast and nearly came again when she saw the small bit of blood on his lip. And when he licked it clean, taking the part of her that was warm with his love, she came again, a short hard punch to her system that had her limp with it.